Director vanishes after spat with conductor at the Royal Opera House

Opera has a distinguished history of strops, hissy fits, temper tantrums - a whole spectrum of diva-ish behaviours and hostility covered by the wonderfully euphemistic phrase "artistic differences".

It remains unusual, however, for a director to walk out on the first day of rehearsals and go to ground - which is what has happened at the Royal Opera House.

A new production of La Finta Giardiniera, written by Mozart when he was aged 18, is due to open there on September 21, directed by the German-born Christof Loy and conducted by Sir John Eliot Gardiner. It is a problematic opera, very long in its original form, and usually requires cuts to make it workable.

According to Sir John Eliot - who has had a reputation for a sometimes abrasive manner - "Christof Loy was not willing to discuss any of the cuts. I was certainly prepared to discuss them, but at the end of the first day of rehearsals he walked out, disappeared, went awol, and no one could find him."

Loy's agent in Austria was unavailable to comment on this version of the disagreement. Sir John Eliot said the dispute turned on the fact that Loy had expected the cuts to be the same as those he had worked on directing the production in Germany. As conductor, however, Sir John Eliot expected that he would, in consultation with the singers and director, suggest the cuts. "It is the music director's job," he said.

"On the first day of music rehearsals I suggested to him that we should look at the cuts, saying that I had new ideas and I didn't want to solidify them until I had worked with the singers. Then we had two rehearsals, which he sat in on. At the end, I said to the singers, 'These are provisional cuts, if you have any comments let me know.' At which point Loy leaped up and said, 'Are you cutting me out completely?' I said, 'Can we discuss it afterwards?' He walked out; I assumed he'd wait outside and we'd have a beer and talk about it. But he had dropped off the ends of the earth ... it's not very edifying."

The opera will now be directed by Loy's assistant Annika Haller, who, said Sir John Eliot, has not worked on the production before.

He said there was now "an excellent cast and a good working atmosphere".

It was from Loy's 2004 revival of Ariadne Auf Naxos that soprano Deborah Voigt was famously sacked by the Opera House, for being too overweight to fit into the little black dress required.